Monthly Archives: July 2010

Cutting down the extra bits

Posted on by
Reply

Here’s an interesting plugin. It’s called WPlite and lets you hide extra bits from your Administration menu. If you’re preparing a site for someone else to use, then having all the menu options that WordPress provides can be a bit of a heavy burden. This plugin acts like Phentermine 37.5, but instead of helping someone shed pounds, it help you shed items from your menus, making it more palatable for users without an expert background.

Here’s what WPLite promises

WPlite (“WordPress lite”) is a WordPress plugin that lets you hide ‘unnecessary’ items from the WordPress administration menu—even the Dashboard. On top of that, you can also hide post meta controls on the Write page, so as to simplify the editing interface.

The result: a minimal, Zen-like WordPress administration area.

Check it out here

WordCamp this weekend

Posted on by
Reply

There are only a few days left before it’s WordCamp time! I’m thrilled to be able to go to WordCamp UK this year. I’ve been wanting to go since I heard about WordCamps, and this one just happened to fit really neatly. It’s in Manchester which means I can boat and train my way there. I may even do some shopping, though I won’t be carrying any wholesale appliances back home. I do want to have a play with an iPad if I find one in the shops, but there are so many things going on, I’m not sure if I’ll find the time for a spot of retail therapy.

So, what’s on the cards? Well, I haven’t had a chance to really study the Running Order, but there are a few sessions that look quite interesting. There are also a number of WordHack sessions which look quite challenging. I’ll keep blogging about it.

NextGen Gallery Plugin

Posted on by
Reply

What plugin do you use to display your photos? One of my favourites is one called NextGEN Gallery Plugin which lets you upload and store photos and even display them on a slide show on your blog. The plugin allows you to upload photos in a variety of ways, my favourite is the ability to upload a ZIP file and let the plugin take care of unpacking and storing the photos.

I’ve used it on a number of different blogs, more recently on the blog for the Isle of Man Choral Society. It’s always allowed me to make great displays on and it’s always made me proud. One I’d recommend to all you WordPress users out there.

100 Million Plugin Downloads

Posted on by
Reply

Have you ever downloaded a WordPress plugin? Well, that’s a bit of a silly question isn’t it; if you’ve ever used WordPress you’ve bound to have downloaded a plugin or two; especially one of the more essential ones like Akismet. Anyway, the WordPress plugin directory has reached a great milestone, exceeding 100 million plugin downloads and counting.

I have a few plugins in the directory myself, nothing as complex as a medical plugin where you can look up all you want to know about human growth hormone; rather there’s WP Auctions, TweetRoll and a bunch of other plugins. Nice to be part of a 100 million target ;)

Going to WordCamp UK

Posted on by
Reply

Yeay! I just managed to sort out a slot so that I can go to Word Camp UK! WordCamp UK is an informal annual gathering of WordPress publishers, designers and developers based in the United Kingdom, held at a different location around the country each year. This year the third WordCamp UK takes place at the Manchester Metropolitan University Business School on the weekend of 17-18 July 2010.

I’m pumped that I’m going to manage to make it this year. I wanted to go last year, but it was in Cardiff and I just couldn’t make the travel arrangements work. Manchester is just a boat and a train ride away from here so it will be great! It’s going to be WordPress all the way, no chance to catch a show, buy nuphedragen or do any sort of shopping. It should be awesome!

Can I make it to WordPress UK?

Posted on by
Reply

There’s an outline of some of the WordCamps happening this summer and the one that caught my eye was WordPress UK! Here’s what they say:

July 17–18: WordCamp UK- Manchester, England, UK. The roving WordCamp UK will be in Manchester this year, and is probably the closest to BarCamp style of all the WordCamps, using a wiki to plan some speakers/sessions and organizing the rest ad-hoc on the first day of the event. I’ll be attending this one as well, and am looking forward to seeing WordPress lead developer Peter Westwood again. I’m also looking forward to meeting some core contributors for the first time in person, like Simon Wheatley and John O’Nolan. Mike Little, co-founder of WordPress, is on the organizing team of WordCamp UK. Tickets on sale now!

I’m going to see if there’s anything I can do to fit that in as it would be awesome to make it to a WordCamp finally. Maybe I can buy gold online, sell it again and use the profits to fund a WordCamp trip.. what do you think?